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Jeff Hornacek Not To Blame For Suns’ Struggles

By Gerald Bourguet

Apr 10, 2015; New Orleans, LA, USA; Phoenix Suns head coach Jeff Hornacek looks on against the New Orleans Pelicans during the second half of a game at the Smoothie King Center. The Pelicans won 90-75. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports
Apr 10, 2015; New Orleans, LA, USA; Phoenix Suns head coach Jeff Hornacek looks on against the New Orleans Pelicans during the second half of a game at the Smoothie King Center. The Pelicans won 90-75. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports /
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Jeff Hornacek
Mar 2, 2015; Miami, FL, USA; Miami Heat guard Goran Dragic (7) dribbles past Phoenix Suns guard Brandon Knight (3) during the second half at American Airlines Arena. Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports /

Roster Changes

No other team in the NBA shipped away one-third of its roster at the All-Star break. Eric Bledsoe may have been the Suns’ best player to that point in the season, but Dragic was undoubtedly more important. Good things when he had the ball in his hands because he was a master in the pick and roll, he always swung the ball to the open teammate and he racked up hockey assists like it was his job.

Taking away that kind of production, not to mention the one-on-one offense of Isaiah Thomas, drastically stunted this team’s offense and ball movement. It’s also worth noting that the Suns lost 31 points per game when they shipped those two away, and even with all that, the only reason the Suns aren’t a playoff team is they play in the West.

You can already see the direct impact of Dragic’s departure. With him and IT gone, the Suns have plummeted to the worst three-point shooting team in the NBA since the All-Star break. As teams like the Golden State Warriors and Atlanta Hawks have shown us this season, having passers setting up open shooters helps improve the quality of three-point looks and thus, three-point percentage.

The Suns were also the league’s best fast break offense last season, but they’ve dropped to third this season. Losing the production of the one-man fast break certainly hurts, and Thomas enjoyed pushing the tempo as well. With them gone, the offense has had Suns fans everywhere sharing in Hornacek’s displeasure:

Bledsoe pushes the ball up the floor every now and then, but he’s not Helter Skelter like Dragic was, he’s not as good of a finisher at the rim and he often loses the ball when the defense collapses. Without Dragic alongside him, Bledsoe has struggled to shoulder the load in the backcourt.

All of the blame can’t be put on Bledsoe either though. His new backcourt mate Brandon Knight struggled to adjust to his role off the ball and it’s worth noting that while all this was going on, the Suns were trying to figure out how to incorporate Brandan Wright.

And that’s not even the full extent of this roster’s upheaval. Gerald Green started receiving inconsistent minutes at the end of January, with Hornacek citing his lack of defense. Is it too much to wonder if Hornacek knew this team couldn’t make the playoffs and decided to start giving the minutes of Green — an unrestricted free agent this summer — to T.J. Warren and Archie Goodwin?

I’m not saying Hornacek handled the whole Gerald Green thing well. As Green has shown us over the last few weeks, he’s still capable of contributing off the bench and those inconsistent minutes really got inside his head. But a year from now, when Green is playing for another team, it’ll be hard to fault Hornacek for playing guys who are actually a part of this team’s long-term core.

All in all, can you really blame a coach for struggling to get a polished product out of his roster when one-third of it was replaced at the trade deadline? Can you blame him for Knight trying to learn how to play off the ball? That’s on the front office, not just Hornacek. And that’s without even mentioning all the injury problems.

Next: Injuries

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